WinRAR tips and tricks

WinRAR is my favorite compression tool because it lets you to do so much with your files apart from just creating zipped archives. I’m gonna show you a few useful things you can do with it that’ll make it easier for you to share and send files.

I’m sure in the past you’ve struggled with fitting very large files onto a CD, a DVD or a USB stick. WinRar can split up big files so you can get them onto your storage media without any problem.

First, find the file you want to split up, right-click on it and choose ‘Add Files to Archive’. In this window that opens up go to the ‘Split to file’ drop-down menu and you’ll see a list of presets. There are options for saving to floppy, DVD, and CD and an auto-detect option that can check the destination space and split the files accordingly. When you’re done just click OK and the files will be generated according to what you specified.

Another nice thing about WinRar is its ability to create self-extracting archives, which is a handy thing if the person you’re sending the file too doesn’t have the right software to open it. Go to ‘Tools’ and pick ‘Connect archive to SFX’. Confirm the procedure and your self-extracting file will be created. This compressed file can then be run just by double-clicking on it, without the need for the Winrar software to be installed.

The last thing I’m gonna show you is how to change the context menu options, which are these ones that show up when you right-click on a file. To define them yourself, go to Options, then Settings and click on the ‘Integration’ tab, which is the last one.

Hit ‘Context Menu items’ and you’ll be able to choose what shows up in the Explorer right-click menu. There’s some useful stuff like ‘Extract here’, ‘Add to Archive’ and ‘Compress and Email’, all of which make it quicker and easier to work with large files and share them with your buddies.

Well, that’s it. I hope these techniques come in handy and hope to see you again soon on another Softonic Screencast. Bye.